By trying to get a DNA sample from Matt Baker without a search warrant, McLennan County prosecutors are trying “to do an end run” around Baker’s right against unlawful search and seizure, Baker’s lawyer contends.

In a motion filed Monday, Baker’s lawyer, Richard Ellison, told 19th State District Judge Ralph Strother that Baker opposes a motion from prosecutors who are seeking a court order to obtain a saliva swab from the former Central Texas Baptist minister.

Baker, 37, is charged in the April 2006 alleged drugging and suffocation death of his wife, Kari. Her death at their Hewitt home initially was ruled suicide by sleeping pill overdose.

Strother has scheduled a hearing for 10:30 a.m. Friday to consider the prosecutors’ DNA request and a defense motion to obtain a transcript of the March 25 grand jury testimony of Vanessa Bulls, a teacher with whom authorities have said Baker was pursuing a relationship before and after his wife’s death.

“The state has failed to show any exigent circumstance or other reason that would allow the court to deny defendant’s constitutional right to be free from unreasonable search and seizure,” Ellison wrote in the motion. “If the state wants to obtain saliva samples from defendant, it is required to submit an application for a search warrant, supported by a detailed affidavit.”

Strother has issued a gag order in the case, preventing Ellison and McLennan County District Attorney John Segrest and prosecutors Crawford Long or Susan Shafer from commenting on the case.

The motion filed by Long seeking Baker’s DNA did not reveal why they are seeking the sample, what they might compare it to or why they did not try to get a search warrant.

Ellison charged that Long and Shafer breached ethical and possibly legal boundaries by sending an office investigator to try to get a voluntary sample from Baker on April 3 before Baker bonded out of the county jail and without contacting Ellison first.

Strother denied Ellison’s motion to have the prosecutors held in contempt of court for contacting Baker, knowing that he was represented by counsel.

twitherspoon@wacotrib.com

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